Tarshia Williams told a federal court jury that the last time she saw her daughter Talia was when her little girl left South Carolina to live with her father in Hawaii in December 2004.

And despite a court order from a South Carolina family court judge granting her two telephone conversations with her daughter each week, Williams said she talked to her daughter only three times after the girl left and before Talia died on July 16, 2005.

Talia’s father, Naeem J. Williams, is on trial for capital murder for the child abuse beating death of his 5-year-old daughter.

He is the first person to stand trial for a death penalty offense in Hawaii since the territorial Legislature abolished capital punishment in 1957.

Williams, 34, a former Schofield Barracks soldier, is facing the death penalty under federal law for killing a child through child abuse or as part of a pattern and practice of abuse and torture.